Bob and Jennifer Jones are a typical American couple living out their lives in a quiet, woodsy neighbourhood. Bob was recently diagnosed with a rare neurological disease but they’re coping as best as they can. When the other Joneses, Pony and John, move in, their world is unsettled enough for them to question what’s left unsaid.

Mental illness is a very isolating experience because many of the symptoms of mental illnesses, especially depression, attack the parts of the mind that interpret relationships, make meaningful connections, and experience joy. Often the effects of mental illness are not felt until a tragedy occurs, a suicide or another violent physical manifestation of the illness, when the impact radiates outwards through family, friends, and communities.

In celebration and recognition of International Women’s Day on March 8th, Week Five of the Short + Sweet Theatre Festival was all about platforming women’s voices and work. Both the Wildcard and the Top 80 plays featured short plays written and/or directed by women and many focusing on issued concerning women in our society.

Catastrophic climate change is an inevitable reality and we’ve been biding our time for decades. Some people in society choose denial and avoidance and others, like the guerrilla gardeners, are choosing revolution. When Kat stumbles into their plans, they plant the seed for her to change her life.

A group of friends gather every once in a while to reconnect with each other over a game of Monopoly. They have different jobs, money and housing situations, and life goals but all of that is put aside for the game. On this night, however, a new player joins the friends and shifts the group dynamics perhaps permanently.

Being queer in a cis-sexist and heteronormative world means a near constant string of coming out situations when you’re placed in the position to correct other people’s assumptions about you. Some coming outs resonate more throughout a lifetime, like with parents or close friends, but that doesn’t make any coming out easy. Here we see 37 different coming out moments through 12 actors and their 94 characters.

Angels in America: A Gay Fantasia on National Themes is a piece of the queer canon for the way it depicts the state of America, specifically New York, during the AIDS epidemic of the 1980s. Tony Kushner’s remarkable script overlaps the lives of five gay men and their families, nurses, coworkers, and neighbours over two parts, approximately six and a half hours of stage time, while also establishing these stories deeply within the political, economic, and social framing of the Reagan years.